VAR in Scottish Football

[GazzyB]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/59093201
 

A vote scheduled for February with a lot of SPFL managers seemingly in favour of it.

 

Surely a case of when, not if?

[The African]

I am broadly in favour of anything to help officials get the correct decision. Having said that, the examples of video officiating and technology aiding umpires/ referees tend to suggest that they don't do away with controversial decisions, they simply change the dynamic of the game. As an example I would say that when VAR was brought into the Bundesliga, I was surprised by the number of soft penalties that were given. Also, the existence of the TMO in rugby still hasn't stopped a fair few awful decisions. Tries given when players are obviously and visibly in touch have still happened. The human element is still there and, as such, mistakes will still be made.

 

 

[Stuwell2]

11 hours ago, The African said:

I am broadly in favour of anything to help officials get the correct decision. Having said that, the examples of video officiating and technology aiding umpires/ referees tend to suggest that they don't do away with controversial decisions, they simply change the dynamic of the game. As an example I would say that when VAR was brought into the Bundesliga, I was surprised by the number of soft penalties that were given. Also, the existence of the TMO in rugby still hasn't stopped a fair few awful decisions. Tries given when players are obviously and visibly in touch have still happened. The human element is still there and, as such, mistakes will still be made.

 

 

So Rangers and Celtic will still get awarded dodgy penalties/offside goals etc

[steelboy]

The most likely effect for us is it that will give referees even more reason to give the Old Firm the benefit of the doubt with the mental excuse that VAR will sort anything too blatant. And even within the decisions themselves it will just be another area where they get preferential treatment.

I also doubt that the clubs will spend the money required to do it properly by paying to have more and higher quality cameras at the games. The decision for the Hearts goal on Wednesday would have been reviewed by VAR but the pictures available were shite so it wouldn't make any difference anyway.

 

[fizoxy]

I don't like VAR at all, but I know it is inevitable that we're going to end up with it. What is also inevitable is that Scottish Football will find a way to make an absolute shit show of it, since the officials managing VAR are the same ones who are hopeless on the pitch.

I also agree with the above, this will lead to even more decisions going the way of the Glasgow two.

I like the way it's implemented in cricket, and baseball to a lesser extent, where challenges can be made, and you lose your challenge if you're wrong, but is suits those games because they have frequent breaks in play anyway.

[MJC]

29 minutes ago, steelboy said:

The most likely effect for us is it that will give referees even more reason to give the Old Firm the benefit of the doubt with the mental excuse that VAR will sort anything too blatant. And even within the decisions themselves it will just be another area where they get preferential treatment.

I also doubt that the clubs will spend the money required to do it properly by paying to have more and higher quality cameras at the games. The decision for the Hearts goal on Wednesday would have been reviewed by VAR but the pictures available were shite so it wouldn't make any difference anyway.

 

As I said the last time this topic came up on here, VAR would cause more problems than it would solve in Scottish football.

I wouldn’t trust those running the game one inch to get the proper equipment and the right people in place to actually make it effective. And you’d still have the silly wee boys chat about how the VAR refs are cheats and will favour the Old Firm etc. 

[stv]

I like the idea of getting the bad calls corrected but dislike the break  up of the flow of the game waiting on var to confirm or deny a call.

Dont celebate a goal til var says its a goal wastes things a bit for me.

[weeyin]

3 hours ago, steelboy said:

The most likely effect for us is it that will give referees even more reason to give the Old Firm the benefit of the doubt

That's my feeling too. If Collum is in the video booth instead of on the pitch, he's going to have even more opportunity to give bad decisions against us.

 

[Ya Bezzer!]

I'm against VAR but I'm under no illusion that eventually it will be adopted.

I have absolutely no faith in it to make the game fairer.  Just look at English football where it's pretty much been a farce and no doubt we'll make an even bigger hash of it.

At the end of the day it still comes down good officiating and we don't have the officials.  VAR will simply make bad and controversial decisions even worse than they are already.

[GazzyB]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/60987568
 

Vote next week. Seems inevitable now. 

[SteelmaninOZ]

3 hours ago, GazzyB said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/60987568
 

Vote next week. Seems inevitable now. 

Good news 

[texanwellfan]

Related to the VAR topic. When they do the offside check, are they looking at furthest part of the body (even arm or hand or whatever) or are they comparing position of the feet? Seems to come down to some hairline decisions and I’m not sure what the rules or guidelines are. 

[MelvinBragg]

I went to an EPL game at the weekend for the first time. I'm definitely not in favour of VAR. Over two minutes standing about whole people look at miniscule details to see if someone is offside. Saturday was a warm day, Tuesday night in November? No thanks.

It doesn't even clear up doubt. Still debate over which decisions get looked at, what angle they looked from. And it will still be the same referees looking at the screens, so if you think they favour the Old Firm,  chances are they'll favour the Old Firm in what they choose to look closer at...

[numpty]

6 hours ago, texanwellfan said:

Related to the VAR topic. When they do the offside check, are they looking at furthest part of the body (even arm or hand or whatever) or are they comparing position of the feet? Seems to come down to some hairline decisions and I’m not sure what the rules or guidelines are. 

Here's a decent unrolled Twitter thread explaining UEFA's VAR offside guidelines compared to the previous EPL guidelines. I assume this is what we'd adopt:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1424680910696427523.html

Interesting to note that the Dutch system is slightly different, there the linesman's original decision stands if it's marginal.

 

[Happy Dosser]

1 hour ago, MelvinBragg said:

I went to an EPL game at the weekend for the first time. I'm definitely not in favour of VAR. Over two minutes standing about whole people look at miniscule details to see if someone is offside. Saturday was a warm day, Tuesday night in November? No thanks.

It doesn't even clear up doubt. Still debate over which decisions get looked at, what angle they looked from. And it will still be the same referees looking at the screens, so if you think they favour the Old Firm,  chances are they'll favour the Old Firm in what they choose to look closer at...

Exactly so: those who think VAR will automatically reduce the number of decisions favouring the Old Firm will probably be disappointed. England has had the system for a while and there is no shortage of controversy about decisions made following a VAR review, some of which to me seem inexplicable, despite all the technology and time taken to analyse the incidents. It's still a human making the final call, not a computer.

It's not a panacea unfortunately and some may conclude that Messrs Collum, Madden,  Dallas etc,  however flawed as referees, are at least relatively cheap alternatives.

[numpty]

2 hours ago, MelvinBragg said:

I went to an EPL game at the weekend for the first time. I'm definitely not in favour of VAR. Over two minutes standing about whole people look at miniscule details to see if someone is offside.

Fwiw, the average VAR offside decision in the EPL (a couple of years ago) took 34 seconds. It's the other decisions that tend to take longer.

[Mortonhallwell]

My problem with VAR is that we will still have the same incompetent referees looking at incidents and making odd decisions despite what the footage shows. Can only see it adding to the controversy. 

[Kmcalpin]

9 minutes ago, Mortonhallwell said:

My problem with VAR is that we will still have the same incompetent referees looking at incidents and making odd decisions despite what the footage shows. Can only see it adding to the controversy. 

Can a referee ignore VAR advice when making a decision?

[SteelmaninOZ]

41 minutes ago, Kmcalpin said:

Can a referee ignore VAR advice when making a decision?

Yes

[Spiderpig]

8 hours ago, texanwellfan said:

Related to the VAR topic. When they do the offside check, are they looking at furthest part of the body (even arm or hand or whatever) or are they comparing position of the feet? Seems to come down to some hairline decisions and I’m not sure what the rules or guidelines are. 

 I think It's measured from the furthest forward part of the  body that can legally score a goal, head/shoulders, chest, legs etc.

[Coatsy]

On 10/30/2021 at 10:34 PM, stv said:

I like the idea of getting the bad calls corrected but dislike the break  up of the flow of the game waiting on var to confirm or deny a call.

Dont celebate a goal til var says its a goal wastes things a bit for me.

The game is constantly stopped just now, how long does it take for some to take a free kick,  fake injuries, players rolling around, aka Livi goalie in the last game. Checking a VAR decision will just be another one and may stop blatant wrong calls

[santheman]

I'm broadly in favour ofVAR.

For every decision that goes for you there will be one that goes against but at least then you know it was the right decision(well hopefully).

On offside I would prefer it if there had to be daylight between the attacker and defender before being called.

This offside because an attacker might have a semi and his shorts are an inch further forward than the defender is  nonsense.

[weeyin]

Overall, I'm more against VAR than for it.

It will be the same pool of officials we've had over the past few years that are in control of the video, so the cynic in me expects an increase in the number of OF pen reviews while the rest of us don't see any change.

The main reason for it was supposed to be to overturn "clear and obvious" errors. For me, that means if you can't tell in about 10 seconds that there was a mistake, then it wasn't clear and obvious. However, that rarely seems to be the case, and VAR reviews often stop the game for a minute or more.

I also agree about the offside decisions. If you need 2 minutes to figure out if a striker's shoulder is 0.5cm ahead of the defender's big toe then the goal should stand. Partly because goals are good for the game and partly because video technology, by its nature, is inaccurate. You can never freeze it the exact nanosecond the ball leaves a player's foot, so it's not fair to try and apply that accuracy to the offside line.

If it's used to correct the decision like Livi's non-penalty the other week, I have no issues with that. Likewise, if it's used to identify off the ball incidents or even review bad tackles that the ref has missed or where he's been unsighted that's OK by me. The rest, I don't really care about.

I'm happy to be proved wrong, but I fear with the standard of officials we have in the SPFL the only thing VAR will bring Scottish football is more wrong decisions that interrupt the flow of the game.

[texanwellfan]

Are we also including Goal line technology? I agree with earlier poster saying if there is no daylight between the bodies is a good standard although it then comes down to determining if there is space or not but it would cover the majority of situations. I would also say for those instances if it’s not obvious, they give benefit of doubt to the attacker. Quick look, “oh look at that gap” OFFSIDE.  Clearly no gap, ONSIDE. “Oh there might be a gap, I’m not sure”  ONSIDE. should be matter of a few seconds none of this red and green lines microscopic analysis. As four fouls etc still going to come to opinions a lot, I think. 

[numpty]

55 minutes ago, texanwellfan said:

should be matter of a few seconds none of this red and green lines microscopic analysis.

This is what the new(er) guidelines described in the article I posted above is pretty much all about... less confusing lines, and more benefit of doubt to the attacker.